The Tékumel Project

Monday, 5 November 2018

The figures shown above, representing male and female fighters from the cities of Dharu and Vanu in Northern Yan Kor have finally been moulded and are ready for production. Command are still being worked on, but the following are available to pre-order:

The Gurék of the Clan of the Red and Green Banner of Dháru

AE-YK 35 Horde (MI Halberds) $40 CAD

AE-YK 37 Horde (Crossbows) $40 CAD

The Gurék of the City of Vánu

AE-YK 40 Horde (HI Halberds) $40 CAD

AE-YK 42 Horde (MI Sword and Javelin) $40 CAD

AE-YK 44 Horde (Bows) $40 CAD

Tekumel Club discounts apply, of course.

As always, a Horde will consist of a mix of 10 figures, either swordsmen, halberdiers, archers or with crossbows. Note that there are male and female poses. I usually do 2/3rds male, 1/3 female but can vary an order to suit.

I still have to pay for the moulding and casting - Master moulds and figures, Production moulds, inc. weapons, accessories (scabbards, quivers), and shields. And I have to pay for any castings ordered. The sculpting costs were paid long ago, thankfully.

An Appeal for Pre-Orders:

Please pre-order these now, or soon, if you are interested.

I should have some castings on hand by the weekend and more coming by mail shortly thereafter. But I won't be able to order many castings without pre-orders, not right away at least.

Saturday, 22 September 2018

Our Posties have voted over 90% in favour of strike action in light of Management's refusal to pay the rural and urban letter-carriers equally.

I support this strike despite the disruption it will bring.

The rural drivers (who are mostly women) get paid by the mile whereas the urban letter-carriers (mostly male) get paid hourly. It works out that the rural letter-carriers get a lower hourly wage. Why? I don't see how the Management can be arguing against this. It seems the easiest thing in the world to fix: just pay them a fair wage.

If they are worried about the impact to the budget, there is an easy solution: start cutting the executive salaries. About 50% should more than take care of all Canada Post's woes. Canada Post has been poorly run for over 40 years; are they ever going to attempt to do things better?

Friday, 24 August 2018

With this new kickstarter, Dark Fable will have over 60 sets of Sword and Sandal goodness for you to put on the tabletop! Below are some of what is coming in this campaign, and some of what has come before. If you want to see more I suggest you check out Dark Fable's site and the kickstarter link above.

Why am I posting this here, on the Tekumel Project blog? Because the Dark Fable miniatures are perfect as proxy figures for Tekumel games. By investing in Dark Fable I am investing in my Tekumel games! :-)

Monday, 25 June 2018

Next Sunday will be Canada's one hundred and fifty-first birthday and to celebrate the event I am making permanent a change I tried earlier this year. Namely, that the prices on Tekumel Project figures are now be stated in Canadian Dollars.

Note that the prices have not changed - just read CAD instead of USD.

And the prices for David Allan Designs will still be USD. This is because I have to import them.

Otherwise customers in countries with a good exchange rate will enjoy a nice savings, and my Canadian customers will finally stop being penalized.

There are two male poses, differentiated primarily by the position of the legs, and one female pose (on the right) for each category.

The so-called "Medium" armour is a chlen-hide cuirass, while scale is used to denote the "Heavy" armour. The way the Professor described the armours it is quite possible to have lighter or heavier versions of either type. He told me that the Yán Koryáni formations should be irregular; armour might be new or handed down by generations of warriors. It was to try to achieve this look - in an affordable manner - that we chose to use the helmet variants that we have. So, one could mix-and-match scale and cuirass armoured infantry within the same unit if one wanted even more variety. It might also be reflected in the way the unit is painted.

You will note that the above figures are lacking heads. Alan added the heads afterwards, using the three variants I think I mentioned in my last post. Looking at these dollies today I wondered what other purposes they could be put to.

My goal for 2018 is to get all our Yán Koryáni back into production by the end of the year. And also those that have never been moulded or cast before. Basically all those YK listings on the Tekumel Club blog, currently in red under the "Palace of Ever-Glorious War" page, would be shown in black and available for purchase.

This will mean that there is a severe imbalance against the Tsolyáni. The Legion of the Lord of the Red Devastation (aka the Red D's) is still only partially ready for production. What else could be added - and in an affordable way? Can any of these dollies be utilized by the Tsolyáni? What do you guys think?

Wednesday, 16 May 2018

Just counted out 672 Yan Koryani helmet plumes, 52 double helmet plumes, 24 large banner plumes, and 50 medium banner plumes. Received today along with a re-stock of figures. And Ahoggya halberd arms, which I frequently seem to run out of.

The mold for the plumes was shown in my last post. It has 27 helmet plumes and two each of the other types. So, assuming the mold was spun 26 times to get the 52 double helmet plumes, that means about half the large banner plumes had problems, and about 30 helmet plumes, but only 2 medium banner plumes.

Working it out in my head, this gives me enough for 24 Warbands (10 troopers plus command). This because I only have 24 large banner plumes and I will likely want one per banner (plus two medium plumes).

How many helmet plumes are required for those 24 Warbands is not as straight forward. The command figures are generic for many of the Yan Koryani gureks, all of those that wear the khil, in fact. One third of the khil-wearing figures have a crested version without a plume. For each pose type there are 9 figures, 6 male and 3 female. Of these, 1/3 have the tall plumed helmet, 1/3 have the shorter plumed helmet with the "beak", and the rest have crests. The 10 troopers in the warband or horde will be more or less randomly picked, 6 male and 4 female - though if a customer requests a specific mix I am happy to oblige. Some gureks might use more than one pose type. For example, spearmen might use the overhand and underarm poses, meaning there are 12 male figures to choose from to put in the packs, and 6 female.

There is additional variation in that the male figures have varying facial hair.

If the 24 Warbands assumed above use all plumed helmets (240 plumes), then that leaves me with 432 plumes, or a further 43 hordes - again, all wearing plumed helmets. So I guess what I have is really enough for about 60 hordes. The Warbands are constrained by the number of banner plumes.

That seems like a reasonable number, except that one must remember these plumes are used for many different units: Valiant of Ke'er, Turquoise Eye, Tleku Miriya I & II, Defense Against Evil, Rulla Gurek, some elements of Makhis Gurek, some of Silver Worm, and Black Bough.

So I think I need to go back to the caster and say: "Same Again, Please!" :-)